


Let's play games where we both scream

by psychomachia



Category: Ready or Not (2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Angst and Romance, Demon Summoning, F/M, Gothic Romance, Houses That Are Haunted By Poor Decisions and Terrible Families
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:02:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23963557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psychomachia/pseuds/psychomachia
Summary: “Welcome to the family,” Daniel says, toasting her. “You really should leave.”
Relationships: Daniel Le Domas/Grace Le Domas
Comments: 7
Kudos: 168
Collections: Id Pro Quo 2020





	Let's play games where we both scream

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dissembler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dissembler/gifts).



### November

Later, Grace will think, I should have come there in the middle of the night. There should have been howling in the distance, a strange withered old man giving her a crucifix, perhaps even mist that curls around her feet like a ghost she can't escape.

There should have at least been a full moon.

Instead, it's a cool, crisp autumn day. Leaves rustle in a fierce gust of wind, making her shiver slightly and tug her cloak around .her. She can hear birds chirping still though, and the sun manages to warm up the ground a little.

As warnings go, it's not a very effective one.

“Hello, dear.” A dark-haired woman motions aside the waiting train of servants, all of whom seem to have identical blank stares upon their faces, and steps forward, smiling

Alex's mother. Grace swallows. “Hello, Mrs. Le Domas,” she says, curtsying. “I'm terribly sorry to impose upon you. Truly, I had no desire to—”

“It's Rebecca, dear.” She takes Grace's hands into her own, grasps them warmly. Her smile broadens. “After all, you're going to be family.”

* * *

Mrs. Le Domas--Rebecca bustles in with her, letting the oak door shut behind them. She's talking the entire time and Grace struggles to keep up.

“Of course, we miss Alex so we're so delighted that he's come back to us. And to choose such a lovely girl,” she says. “I always knew my son had excellent taste.”

“Thank you?” Grace manages.

“You're lucky,” a voice from the shadows says. “When she met my wife, I think she wanted to brain her with a fireplace poker.”

“Daniel!” Rebecca says sharply.

Daniel, Grace thinks. The older brother. The drunkard that Alex speaks of in pitying terms. What a waste, he says. But I love him.

“Oh, I apologize,” Daniel says. “We save these sorts of tales until after the first week.”

“Where's Charity?” Rebecca ignores him, looking around. “I thought you had brought her here.”

Daniel waves a glass of something dark, sloshing a little on the floor. “Perhaps she's appraising items to sell. I do know a set of rather hideous but expensive candlesticks have gone missing.” He looks at Grace. “Perhaps you'd be interested in one of those ugly little vases instead? They're supposedly rare antiques.”

“Not everyone is your wife,” Rebecca says sweetly. “Grace may not come from a certain background but Alex has much better taste than you.”

“Of course.” Daniel says. “She's probably intelligent enough to go for the jewelry instead. Word to the wise, Helene has the more expensive pieces.”

“If you're not going to be helpful, Daniel--” Rebecca begins, before Grace hears a door slam open as two voices raised in argument get louder.

“Alex, be reasonable.”

“With all due respect, father, go to Hell--”

Two men come into view. One must be Alex's father and Grace is aware of his dismissive glance at her. The other is---

“Alex?” Grace asks.

He blinks.

Then her beautiful, kind, sweet fiance turns to his mother and says, “I thought I told you she wasn't to come here. Not until--”

Rebecca holds up her hands. “Alex, dear, you know we needed to meet her. And she has nowhere else to go, no family to take care of her. Why not have her stay here until the wedding?”

“Your mother is right,” Mr. Le Domas says. “Tradition states--”

Alex storms off. In the distance, Grace hears a door slam.

“Welcome to the family,” Daniel says, toasting her. “You really should leave.”

### December

“He's going to get you a coral necklace,” Daniel says. “If you don't want it, I would let him know before you have to pretend to enjoy it.”

Grace turns around. Daniel is lounging in the doorway, his smile crooked.

“I don't have to pretend,” Grace says. “I'll love anything he gets me.”

“You say that now, but-- Daniel shrugs. “Don't blame me if you end up with a truly horrific oil painting of yourself that you'll never be able to sell.”

“Do you speak from experience?” Grace says. “Or are you referring to that portrait of your great-grandfather in the hallway?”

Daniel shudders. “Let's not talk about Victor,” he says. “In fact, let us never speak of any of my family.”

It's strange but she finds herself talking to Daniel more as each day passes. Alex is busy either arguing with his parents or off on business that keeps him gone for days at a time. Rebecca will give her a smile before suggesting that she take up an occupation, such as needlework or gardening to pass the time.

Helene is... Grace shudders. Helene is terrifying.

Everyone else walks by her as if she's a particularly troublesome phantom that can be made to go away if you just ignore it.

“Come now,” Grace teases. “Surely there must be some relatives that you like.”

Daniel's face drops for a second, and he looks lost. A child, Grace thinks. A boy looking for someone to love him.

“I suppose,” he says eventually. “You are marrying one of them.”

Grace nods. “I suppose this is where you tell me that he's too good for me.”

“Why would I do that?” Daniel sounds genuinely confused.

There's a bitterness that Grace pushes down as she thinks of the whispers, of the rumors, of the parties she attended as his fiancee where everyone looked at her and she could see them trying to figure out how someone like her could attract a Le Domas.

She's not with child, but there are enough people who think that's the only way someone like Alex could love her.

“Because,” she says after a few awkward moments, “because he probably is.”

Daniel sighs, slumps against the doorframe. “I love my brother,” he says. “He's so much better than me in so many ways.”

Grace closes her eyes. Right, she thinks. Another person who--

“But if anything,” Daniel continues. “You're too good for our family.”

Her eyes fly open and she looks at Daniel's face. He's completely serious. It's an uncomfortable look on him.

“Daniel,” she says and then she hears Alex's voice coming down the hallway.

“Let him know you'd like something useful instead. Perhaps a dagger. Or a sabre.”

* * *

Alex does end up getting her a coral necklace and Grace smiles and laughs and treats it as if it is the finest present in the world.

She gives him a watch, and at least Alex is fond of it, even if Helene and Mr. Le Domas look at it with mildly hidden disdain.

The rest of the night—well, Grace is at least assured that Daniel cannot drink all of the brandy.

Back in her room, she's about to crawl into bed, when she sees a small wrapped package sitting on her pillow.

_Something Useful._

She tosses the small white card aside, opens it up.

A thin band of silver, set with an opal. Grace looks at it, then looks back at the card.

“Useful?”

She flips the card around.

_Twist it._

Grace does and a small compartment opens up.

“Ah,” she says. “And to think, I just got you a book.”

### January

Given that's she used to various high-pitched arguments and the constant sound of movement all around her, Grace is surprised to wake up to relative silence.

There are no servants to greet her, though that's not a clear indication that anything is wrong. Grace has managed to negotiate herself down to one maid, since there will always be a part of her that finds it strange to have anyone do something for her.

She's quite accustomed to being able to fend for herself.

So she wraps a robe around herself, puts on a pair of slippers and wanders the dark hallways. No doubt there will be someone nearby to chastise her for doing so, express that as a future wife to the possible head of the Le Domas family if Daniel doesn't get his act together.

If Daniel's reaction is any indication, he's already made his decision about that some time ago.

“Hello?” she calls out.

There's no response.

It's all right, she thinks. This is a large house. They're probably all in the main dining room. Perhaps it's some special occasion she hasn't been made aware of.

There are many things she's realizing she hasn't been told about.

What happened to Helene's fiancee? For that matter, what happened to Helene? Surely she wasn't born that way.

How did the Le Domas go from a relatively obscure family involved primarily in trade into one of the most influential and powerful in a short period of time?

Why do people stare nervously at a particular chair every now and then and then inform her in superficially bright tones that there is nothing wrong, don't be silly, you're just imagining things?

Grace isn't prone to fancy, so yes, there is clearly something there.

And it doesn't help that as she keeps walking the halls of this house, she is coming to one inescapable conclusion.

There is no one here.

Perhaps she should try to take a vase.

* * *

Once the sun goes down, Grace realizes the most horrible part about all of this.

“This is a terrible house,” she says. “Who built this?”

In the daytime, she can pretend that it's not a looming monstrosity with shadowy corners and dimly lit rooms hiding strange and curious objects.

In the dark? Well, it just turns into a nightmare. And the snow has piled up aside, so high, that even if she wanted to try to get into town, to find some companionship?

She's trapped.

“I'll just go to sleep,” Grace says. “I'll go to sleep and when I wake up, everything will be fine.”

A board creaks.

She didn't make the noise.

Grace swallows. “This isn't haunted,” she says. “Spiritualism is nonsense and ghosts aren't real and--”

There's a distant thud.

“There is nothing to be afraid of.” She fumbles behind her, makes her way to the wall of the latest shadowy room she's wandered into.

“I'm not afraid,” she says. “I'm not afraid, I'm not--”

Her hand closes around an object. “I have a poker.”

There's a rattling at the door. Grace grips the poker in her hand, raises it.

The knob turns.

“Grace?”

Daniel barely misses being smashed upon the head. “Oh, good,” he says. “I've always wanted to go out that way.”

“Why didn't you say anything?” she yells. Then she succumbs to some feeling she's been only lately becoming aware of, one that she knows is deeply inappropriate and not fitting and yes, she's hugging him tightly. She can blame it on her terror in the morning.

Daniel doesn't let go for some time.

Eventually, reluctantly, they part.

“Honestly, Daniel, why on earth did you stay quiet?”

“Would you believe I didn't want to scare you?” At Grace's incredulous look, he nods. “Yes, that was stupid. I was worried though that you were alone.”

“Where is everyone?” Grace asks.

Daniel looks uncomfortable. “Father and Alex had some unexpected business and Mother went along with them. I believe several of the servants were given time off due to illness and--

“Aunt Helene?”

“Oh, she's still here,”Daniel says.

“And she didn't say anything?”

There's a creaking above them.

Daniel looks at Grace. “Would you have wanted her to?”

“Fair point.”

### February

“This was a mistake,” she says.

Daniel's eyes are sad and knowing. “Of course it is. You wouldn't be a Le Domas unless you knew that and did it anyways.”

His hands reach down to cup her breasts, slide along and she gasps as their coolness touches a nipple.

She lets her own hands run down his chest. It's deeply wrong. She shouldn't be in love with Alex's brother, shouldn't feel anything for him.

He's hard against her and she's definitely going to pull away, but instead she's kissing him, letting herself have this one thing because she's going to marry Alex, going to be a Le Domas, going to get everything she's worked for, but it's not what she wants.

Not at all.

_“You're an interesting one.”_

There's something smoky in the air, and she begins to cough, pulling away from Daniel who crumples to the ground.

She stares in horror at him. His eyes are open and vacant, and blood runs from his neck, pools beneath him. It doesn't stop, spreading until she's standing in a lake, her dress stained in red, and she's coughing, choking on ash and dirt and--

Grace wakes up.

It's a bright sunny morning.

She can hear the sounds of movement around her, of someone laughing. There's a particularly persistent bird chirping outside.

“I might not have thought this through,” she says.

* * *

“I had a nightmare." Grace is fairly sure that this is the type of situation she's supposed to expressly avoid, but on the whole, having your brother-in-law alone with you in your room is far less worrisome than wondering if all the omens that keep cropping up are trying to tell you something. 

Daniel quirks his brows. “Not unexpected. I would venture to say that if this is your first one since living here, I would be deeply surprised.”

“It was about us.”

“That's usually not the type of dreams I like to inspire,” he says. “Dare I ask what happened?”

“You died.”

Daniel takes it in, nods thoughtfully. “I hope at least it was in the arms of a beautiful--”

“There was a man there.” Grace interrupts. She frowns, trying to remember. “There was smoke, as if there was a fire--”

There's a crash on the floor and Grace jumps, looks at Daniel. He's dropped his glass, the shards scattering around him. His hand is bleeding slightly, but he doesn't seem to notice, too pale with fear and... guilt?

“Daniel, you've hurt yourself!” She pushes aside her own remembered terror – so much blood and she couldn't stop it – and reaches for a handkerchief to wrap around the wound.

Daniel flinches back.

“You have to let me help you,” Grace tries to reach out again, but he pulls his arm against him, stubbornly keeping it from her. “You're hurt and--”

“You can't stay here,” Daniel says softly. “You need to go.”

She reels back, hurt. “I thought we had gotten past this,” she says.

“I should have made you leave the first day you arrived,” Daniel continues. He's not even looking at her anymore, just staring dreamily into the distance. “But Alex told me he didn't want to lose you. He said--”

“Daniel?” Alex stands in the doorway. His initially confused expression shifts, turns wary and caged. “What are you doing here?”

“If you love her, Alex, let her go,” Daniel says, getting to his feet and stumbling towards the door. Drops of blood spill to the floor behind him. Alex moves aside.

“Don't make the mistake the family has. Don't turn her into one of us.”

And then he's gone.

### March

It's a month before the wedding and Grace knows she's making a terrible mistake.

She doesn't need dreams or cryptic warnings or Alex's increasing absence to know that deep down, there's a voice in her that says to get out before she gets in over her head.

“Just think, dear,” Rebecca says, patting her on her hand. “You'll be a Le Domas soon.” She leans in confidingly. “Don't worry. If my son loves you, they'll love you too. And if not--” Her smile gets wider. “Well, it won't matter. You'll have the money and power to make them.”

“Yes,” Grace says. It's both reassuring and yet very much not at all.

It doesn't help that Daniel has taken to avoiding her. She knows he's drinking even more since the servants gossip and she actually takes the time to listen to them.

Alex is also gone, spending long hours with his parents that leave him cool and distant. If he's trying to hold onto her, he doesn't seem to be expending that much effort upon it.

She hasn't seen Emilie that much. Apparently, she's torn between her children and the laudanum she secrets in various places around her boudoir, and wasn't that something that her own lady's maid took particular relish in telling her.

There's always Aunt Helene, but there's also drowning oneself in the nearby lake and that would promise to be a less painful fate.

So Grace prepares for a wedding she increasingly doesn't want to a man she no longer understands in a house she is fairly convinced hides more secrets than she wants to know.

“I just wish you could have had a June wedding,” Rebecca says. “Married 'neath April's changeful skies, a checkered path before you lies.”

“I heard differently,” Grace says, narrowing her eyes. “Marry in April when you can, joy for maiden and for man.”

“Well, let's hope,” Rebecca says.

* * *

“It won't end well.”

It's probably the nicest thing Helene has ever said to her.

Grace has prided herself on avoiding the woman up until now by using the clever strategem of never being in the same room as her, but alas, her luck has run out. Somehow, she is now trapped in one of the more cluttered sitting rooms with her, and the door is so very far away.

“I suppose that's really up to Alex and--”

Helene scoffs. “You're not a Le Domas. You wouldn't understand.” Her smile is calculating, malicious. “But you will, if you're lucky.”

Grace has never been one to back down. “And if I'm not?”

“Then we will be even more fortunate that you won't be around to pollute our bloodline.”

“What happened to your fiance, Helene?” Grace asks. She can play this game too. “Did he decide he wasn't worthy enough of the Le Domas family as well?”

Helene's mouth snaps shut and she glares as if she could murder Grace with nothing more than her beady eyes when there's a perfectly respectable axe above the fireplace. “You know nothing about him.”

No, Grace thinks. I do. I know that he must be dead. I know that you must still love him or you wouldn't be wearing mourning decades later. I know that the family is to blame somehow because you hate them so much and no one will look you in the eyes.

I know that I am deeply regretting every decision that has led me here, and that the one thing that did give me some solace in this morass of insanity has decided to leave me to fend for myself and took all the good spirits with him.

“It was a pleasure talking with you as well,” Grace says, backing her way to the door. “I'm sure you'll have a lovely time at the wedding.”

The door shuts behind her and she lets out a shaky breath.

“Just three more weeks,” she says. “It'll all be over soon.”

### April

“You'll be safe,” Alex says. “I promise, I'll take care of you. We'll figure this out.”

Five hours later, Grace is hiding in one of the more dimly-lit rooms, holding a shovel and a lantern. Her dress is covered in blood, there's at least one unconscious maid stashed away in a closet, and her in-laws are trying to kill her.

But at least she knows she wasn't insane.

“Just imagining things.” Right.

“I told you to leave.”

Grace whirls around and Daniel ducks.

“Grace, if you wish to kill me, at least please do so intentionally.” He's awkwardly holding a sword and looking around. “Because--”

“Did you know about this?” Grace asks. “And you didn't--” she breaks off, horribly afraid she's about to start crying. “You didn't tell me.”

“How could I have told you?” Daniel says. “I'm a drunken reprobate who has untoward feelings involving his future sister-in-law and a deep antipathy towards his current wife. As far as trustworthy sources go, I'm at the bottom of the barrel.”

“I would have believed you,” she says quietly. “I trust you.”

“You shouldn't,” he says, his voice coming out broken and oh, no, she thinks. They can't both be about to cry? “I'm a terrible person--”

She walks forward and kisses him.

It takes him a moment and then he responds eagerly and it's just as she dreamed--

It's just--

There's no smoke. No voice. No ash in her throat.

But there's still blood and Daniel falling to her feet, a crossbow bolt in his neck.

“Grace,” Alex says. “How could you?”

She spins around and clocks him in the head with the shovel.

* * *

Grace storms into the main dining room.

Somewhere behind her, there's a trail of Le Domas blood. Some of them could still be alive, she supposes. If they're lucky.

“I want to make a deal,” she says. “I've earned the right.”

_Have you now?_

It's not spoken out loud, but a whisper into her ear that reverberates down to her bones.

“I've played the game,” Grace grits her teeth. “It's almost sunrise, they've all lost, and--”

_You suppose I would actually deal with you. Why would I? What have you to offer?_

Grace lets her anger out into her smile, a cutting thing that was the last thing Aunt Helene saw before—well, it was a lovely wedding so she wins on two fronts now. “Aren't you tired of dealing with them?” she says. “They'll sacrifice loved ones left and right all for a little money and power. And they're so very terrible at it too. If someone like me, a nobody with no reputation or background could take them out, are they really worth keeping around?”

_Interesting. Go on._

“I don't have people to give you or power or money,” Grace says. “I'm not a Le Domas and I won't ever be one. But I do have one thing I can give you—peace, damn quiet, and freedom from the constant demands of an inferior family. I won the game. You can break the deal you have with them, fair and square.”

_Tempting. What would you ask for in return?_

“Just one thing,” Grace says. “A small thing.”

_I'm listening._

### May

In the end, it's Charity that comes up to her.

The rest of the Le Domas family has either left or is studiously pretending she isn't there. Grace suspects that they'd be trying to murder her even now, but somehow losing your vast, inexplicable, and dubiously obtained fortune is distracting them from petty matters like herself. She suspects they probably would have preferred death to penury, but unfortunately for them, Grace is the one holding all the cards now. 

Let them suffer, she thinks. Let them lose for once and realize what a even playing field really looks like. 

“You must be pleased,” Charity says. She still favors her left leg, and Grace is meanly satisfied about that. “The family goes down in flames and you get to walk away completely unscathed.”

“Not unscathed,” Grace says quietly.

Charity gives her a penetrating look. “I suppose we all have to pay a price then.” She laughs, soft and mocking. “Who knew it would be my husband?”

“Is there something you wish to discuss with me, Charity,” Grace says patiently, “or are you just here to try to cause me pain?”

“Both.” Charity's fiddling with something in her hand and she tosses it to Grace. She catches it, opens up her hand.

It's a ring.

“It isn't as if I need it anymore,” Charity says. “Do whatever you want with it. As for me, I will be a grieving widow for the suitable amount of time and then I'll do what I do best.”

Then she unexpectedly smiles behind her veil. “What we do best.”

“Yes?”

“Survive.”

* * *

It's dark and cool inside the inn when she arrives back at her room. The innkeeper has given her a quiet room, away from all the other guests, thanks to a healthy bribe and a very well-acted facade of a widow looking to mourn her loss.

She takes her gloves off, removes her veil, lets her hair loose.

“Was it a good funeral?”

Grace smiles as Daniel comes from out of the shadows. It has been a difficulty keeping him hidden, she thinks, but soon, they'll have no need.

The Le Domas family will be too preoccupied with losing everything else in their lives. 

There will always be a scar in his neck. It's a reminder, Le Bail says. It's to let him know that nothing comes without someone else paying for it.

And also that sometimes the payment can be made by the people who owed it in the first place.

“You'll be happy to know that they gave you the smallest possible stone they could.”

The coffin's empty, but no one will see it. They'll see what they expect to see and not look to the truth beneath.

Daniel comes over, kisses her gently. “So what happens now?”

“I was thinking of travelling,” Grace says. “I've had enough of sinister mansions for a while. Although,” she adds, frowning, “we may have an issue with funds before too long. The Le Domas won't be able to pay to keep my mouth shut for much longer, given their increasing insolvency.” She's used to being penniless, but Daniel's not going to be eager to learn the delights of steerage class.

“Oh, that's not a problem,” Daniel says cheerfully. He takes Grace's hand, presses something cold and firm into it. She looks down.

“You can't be--”

“I told you, they are worth quite a bit of money.”

The candlesticks drop to the ground as Grace decides that she's had enough of talking for a while.


End file.
